An Anthropologist's Arrival: A Memoir

The Big Love

99 The Big Love i Wrote a Poem. Yes, once I loved but that is overpast. Though pain is sweet, it cannot always be. I have outlived hope’s wearying agony For hope can torture, but it cannot last. This time, it really was love, and it nearly killed me. Yes, literally— love and tuberculosis. It began so gaily, like six o’clock of a summer morning. In Boston I had a basement flat on an alley, and above me there was a young man. Yes, he could quote Shakespeare (though he did not respect him overmuch). Yes, he could talk about books, and he had the right manners. In fact, there was nothing the matter with him at all, and how we enjoyed each other! He was a drama critic, who initiated me into the modern plays. I wandered with him in European literature. We capped each other’s bon mots. I was ready at any minute. Of course, though, it had to be marriage. I laughed lightly at his stories of unmarried affairs. They concerned, of course, a different type of woman, different caste I mean. So I accepted his tentative advances as one would watch the sun come higher on a lovely picnic morning. I did not want it to move too fast, for every moment of the preparations was so pleasant. His vacation was due, and mine could be managed. Said he, “I have a friend who will lend me a shack on an island in Maine. You bring your books, and I’ll bring my typewriter. We’ll work and invite our souls.” We both liked writing, and we liked the ocean. We would go swimming. We’d live on lobsters and have a lovely time. Becoming ruth underhill 100 It would be like my sojourns in mountain huts, I thought, with perfectly unknown men. As experienced mountain climbers, we had all been quite impersonal, and I was glad my, oh yes, that my love had such a civilized point of view. “Will you get the arrangements on the boat?” he asked. I was glad to be used but marveled a little at his laziness in not being ready to telephone for a couple of cabins. The shack was wonderful, empty and creaking, so that we used our blankets and borrowed camp chairs. The communion went on gaily in the sea air, though he seemed a little less brilliant than usual. Then there came a night! That was when he nearly dashed the kerosene lamp on the floor, and I slept outdoors. “But what did you think I meant?” he asked next day, “proposing this trip à deux?” “But, but, I’ve been on camping trips before.” “With no sex?” “The men were married.” I shall not finish this story in detail. We tried to make up. He said he respected me and, yes, admired me. Not for my sex attitude, which was silly, but for my brain. Only I must see that a pig like me would never have appealed to him as a wife. Thanks for the gay interlude. The aftermath of that lasted a long time. I left Boston and plunged into a less rewarding job in New York.* I remember one midnight—I was still working toward midnight—when I sat alone on a bench in the subway. “Why do people kill themselves for lost love?” I thought. No physical act is necessary. One just dies. A doctor, later, found traces of tuberculosis in my lungs. I don’t know when I could have had it except in those dreadful months. • I got on the train and went to New York and found a place where the social service workers congregated and could maybe get a job. Finally, I met a young woman who reminded me of a big hatchet. * In her interviews Underhill inconsistently states that she left Boston because her true love had moved to New York and she followed him. However, given the story’s overall tenor, it seems to us more likely that she left Boston to escape her love. The Big Love 101 She was tall and blonde and had a fierce sharp voice and sharp blue eyes. I explained to her that I would like a job in social work. She was with the Charity Organization Society. “Miss Underhill!” she said. “Are you a good soldier?” “I don’t think so,” I answered. “I...